The Whistler
by michael1812
Summary: There's a familiar tune in the dark. How the hell did it get there? No response from the comms. Someone's there. Something evil. This can't be happening, but it is.


It was the whistle that first attracted me to the neural cluster, and a vague kind of feeling I had heard it somewhere before.

Somewhere nice, and then I remembered.

Images from that one movie flashed before my eyes and I couldn't help but smile.

I zoned in on the whistler, hiding in the dark.

Where was he?

How did he know that tune?

I leaned into the passageway, laying my weight upon my anchor and arm.

I peek and whistle.

The game's afoot.

And there it was, just like I suspected, an echo in the dark, playful and teasing, beckoning me.

I bit my lip and moved ahead into the chamber, deep down below Pilot's roots, his organs or cables, whatever they were.

I hadn't decided upon what to call them.

This living ship still confuses the heck out of me.

I pout my lips and whistle three notes, a playful, rhythmical "where are you?".

I used to like hide and seek when I was a child, but out here it gets a little bit too real sometimes.

Like when the bad guys find you they don't just tag you, they _kill you_.

If you're lucky.

And man, they always find me.

"Hey..." I cried into the dark passageway, tumbling, staggering over heavy cables.

He whistled.

It was definitely a he.

What am I doing here?

"Hey!"

I approached the threshold of the next corridor, but something stopped me, something was holding me back.

Moya's sounds echoed through the chasms, like the distant humming of a whale, like the deep tremors inside a submarine, and the pressure was rising.

Curiosity overtook me when I stood there too long.

Damnit, I shouldn't be doing this.

I've watched way too many horror movies to know this can't end well.

Time to bring in the cavalry with a tap on my comms.

"Pilot?"

The gloom is waiting.

I could've sworn the air itself was exhaling, breathing in and out, patiently.

I must be losing my mind.

It must be Saturday.

"Yo, Pilot!"

The heavy, gritty bulkhead above my head will never buckle under my vice-like grip, but it doesn't stop me trying.

"D'Argo!?"

No reply.

Damnit.

"DAMNIT!"

I get my cool back, got to stay cool, got to stay focused, or I will lose my mind.

Or I could've lost it years ago, but the fact remains I'm here, I'm now and I need to snap out of it.

"Guys, there must be something wrong with my comms. I'm not hearing anything. If you can hear me, know that I'm down in the neural cluster checking something out...what the hell is that whistling?"

I really should've known better.

Something could've happened.

Someone could've disabled the comms.

I should be heading to Command, but I'm not.

"Is anybody down there?" I shout in vain, expecting no reply, but there was one.

I run into the darkness, expecting someone to reach out and grab me at any moment, but there's nothing, and I emerge on the other side intact, without a scratch.

But there's more here.

More acoustics, more light.

More places where someone could be hiding, waiting for him.

Who the hell was this guy and how did he get on board?

There.

At first glance it could've been anything, but then I saw what it really was.

At the next hub, crouched down beside Pilot's connections and cables to Moya, was a figure.

Humanoid, maybe its got antlers.

Maybe it's a dog without a nose.

Maybe it's Scorpius.

"You!"

Another corridor first, but I don't care now.

It could've been a diversion, but the thought didn't occur to me until it was too late and I was already standing over him with Winona at the ready.

"Step away from the cables!"

Why was I doing this?

Why was I pointing a gun at him?

What am I going to say next? 'Put 'm up!'? 'Hands in the air!'?

There it was again.

Why wouldn't he stop whistling?

"How the hell do you know that?"

He wouldn't answer me.

He wouldn't do as I asked.

He wouldn't even look up and acknowledge my existence.

He was fiddling with something, a tool, he was doing something to the cables.

A casual whistle flowed from his puckered lips, in exhalation and inhalation, this handyman didn't even flinch when I put the gun to his head.

Like I wasn't even there. Like I was just shouting at thin air, at a spectre, at a ghost.

"That song. I know that song."

"Of course you do, John." the figure spoke.

Pure arrogance in his voice.

It made me grip Winona even more.

He looked human.

He looked like me.

"That's because I am you, John."

"Get the hell away from me!"

The smug look on his face shone through everything in his attitude, even though he wasn't looking at him and kept staring at his work.

"Go to sleep, John! This is just your imagination!"

"No, this is real!"

"Of course it is, John. If you want it to be."

I.

I couldn't.

No.

My hands.

They weren't holding a gun.

They were holding two cables.

No.

I'm over here!

I'm me.

"Not anymore."

"Scorpius!"

"There's that name again, John!"

"Get out of my head!"

"This doesn't concern you. Or him."

"Get the hell away from those cables!"

I got up.

I saw my hands.

I dropped the cables.

I saw him stand up.

I saw him watch the cables.

"How very brave of you, John. But pointless."

"I am in control!"

He didn't even say anything.

He just smiled.

"You're not doing this to me! That's not me! I'm not doing this! Stop it! STOP IT! THIS IS ME!"

"It'll all be over soon, John."

"No!"

"It's useless to resist."


End file.
